Gujarat Riots

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Godhra attack not planned KINGSHUK NAG TIMES NEWS NETWORK [ THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2002 12:23:33 AM ] ODHRA: A month after the Godhra carnage, police investigations have not thrown up any evidence that the mindless act, in which 58 passengers perished, was pre-planned. ‘‘The case is still being investigated and if there was some deep conspiracy, then we are yet to find it,’’ said inspector-general of police (railways) P P Agja.Agja, who for the better part of the last one month has been camping at Godhra, spoke with The Times of India standing in front of the railway police station on the platform where trouble began.According to the sequence of events as found by the police, all was not well in coach S-6 of the Ahmedabad-bound Sabarmati Express on that day. A group of unruly Ram Sevaks had boarded the train at Lucknow without reservations and had put to discomfort the 66 genuine passengers of the coach. Some of the ticket-paying passengers had to sleep on the floor and so overcrowded had the compartment become that the ticket collector who came aboard the train at Ratlam (two stations before Godhra) was not allowed to enter the coach.At Godhra station, the hawkers on the platform started stoning the train after an unsavoury incident, especially targeting coach S-6 because some occupants of the coach had given offence. ‘‘At any point of time, there are some 250 hawkers on the station. Some of them carry stoves with kerosene in them. All of them live in the slum called Signal Falia next to the station,’’ said Agja. He added: ‘‘This means it is not surprising that a crowd could collect at the station so fast.’’Agja said: ‘‘The people who live cheek by jowl in the slums next to the station include a fair share of criminals indulging in railway crimes like looting, pickpocketing and stealing of goods of passengers and also railway property. All of them are Ghanchi Muslims and they are uneducated, without any jobs and poor.’’ Which is probably why the reaction of the slum dwellers was disproportionately higher than the offence given to them.Deputy superintendent of police (railways) K C Bawa said the chief of the lumpen crowd, which attacked the train, is still absconding. ‘‘We have his name and are looking for him,’’ he said.As many as 64 persons have been arrested till now in the case-----------------------------------Advice to Muslims not a threat: RSS TIMES NEWS NETWORK [ THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2002 4:50:33 AM ] EW DELHI: Describing its ominous advice to Muslims that they should earn the goodwill of the Hindus for their own safety as a ‘‘statement of fact’’ and not a ‘‘threat’’, the RSS on Thursday warned Muslims against siding with Leftists.Justifying the organisation’s controversial Bangalore resolution, the RSS spokesperson M G Vaidya said the Sangh was ready to talk to Muslims ‘‘to remove irritants’’ in the same way as it was talking to the Church. The Muslims should not play into the hands of known RSS-baiters like the Communist parties ‘‘and should condemn any violence on Hindus whether in Kashmir or elsewhere’’, he said. This would ‘‘assuage the pent-up feelings’’ of those Hindus who believe in the RSS’s way of thinking. He added that ‘‘Christians should also accept that there is salvation outside the church.’’Spelling out the ‘‘irritants’’ to the RSS, Vaidya said, ‘‘We don’t want people to be killed when they go for pilgrimage to Amarnath or Sabarimala (Kerala). We want Muslims to remove them (irritants) and then there will be no occasion to disrupt social harmony.’’

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TODAY'S EDITORIALS Blind Apathy [ THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2002 1:12:15 AM ] “My heart is bursting. My grief is beyond limit”. Tragically, these words of a Gujarat riot survivor do not seem to find an echo in the hearts of most Indians. The contrast couldn’t be more stark. Flashback to the Gujarat earthquake in 2001. In a magnificent outpouring of compassion, India rose as one to rush relief supplies to the affected. It was a reaffirmation of the human spirit, of a concern for fellow citizens. Yet today, when an entirely avoidable tragedy is being played out in Gujarat, that fellow feeling is singularly lacking. This newspaper has recorded in chilling detail how a state government not only connived in the killing of its citizens but is resolutely refusing to help the survivors. In fact, a state minister actually demanded that even the few relief camps which exist must be shut down as he feared it would provoke further communal violence. Perhaps nothing better could be expected from the Narendra Modi government. But where are the NGOs, other civil society groups, concerned citizens? After the earthquake, hundreds of ordinary people made their way there to pitch in with relief efforts. Schoolchildren across the country campaigned to raise funds and material, corporates came forward with their largesse, the Central government swung into action. The volume of relief material which poured into the state was so great that the administration actually turned down offers with the argument that excess aid would adversely affect the state’s economy. Today tens of thousands of terrified riot survivors are huddled in makeshift camps, even more have sought refuge in the homes of relatives. The only help that these desperate people are getting is from needy members of their own community, many of whom have lost their homes and loved ones in these riots. A cynical political class has sought to explain its unforgivable apathy with the question ‘What about the victims of Godhra?’ The task of rehabilitating the victims of Gujarat is monumental. It will involve reconstruction of homes and finding work in the face of the sangh’s call to boycott Muslim businesses and deny work to them. Above all, it will involve counselling to overcome the trauma of having witnessed unspeakable horrors. Perhaps nothing will completely heal these scars, but the message going out to Gujarat is that India simply does not care. The National Human Rights Commission has recorded in terrifying detail the vicious barbarism that was visited on a helpless minority. The few individuals who have had the courage to speak out have corroborated this. Our silence will only encourage the fundamentalists who perpetrated the massacre of innocents. They will conclude, and perhaps rightly so, that they can get away with it. They will surmise that the reign of terror and fear that they have unleashed has paid off. The state government has made a vague statement about a relief package being worked out. Had there been a greater public display of concern for the needy, relief work would have been in full swing today. This apathy on the part of civil society is perhaps the greatest victory for the proponents of communal hatred. And the greatest loss for all of us who espouse civilised values

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Tinderbox Gujarat KINGSHUK NAG [ THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2002 1:06:54 AM ] Economic Woes Fuel Communal FlamesA little known fact about Gujarat is that its economy has been in a bad shape for the last few years. Leave alone talk of growth, official statistics indicate that Gujarat’s gross state domestic product (GSDP), in real terms, has been falling over the last few years. This negative growth rate has been primarily due to the bad performance by the agricultural sector which has been severely hit by poor rainfall. At the same time, growth in the industrial and services sector has not been fast enough to compensate for the loss of output from agriculture.Although in popular perception, Gujarat is a favoured investment decision, such an illusion has been created by aggregate figures. A few big projects like Reliance’s 27 million tonne refinery command a lion’s share of the total investment. In any case, even the industrial growth rate in the state has been decelerating in the last few years. The areas affected most by the erratic monsoons are north and central Gujarat and Saurashtra. South Gujarat — the region around Surat — falls in a different climatic zone and has been spared. It is these areas of north and central Gujarat that have borne the brunt of the latest round of rioting. Reeling under drought conditions, some villagers in these parts of the state appear to have vented their accumulated frustrations arising from economic want. The result is looting, arson and killing. Needless to add, the fact that the ire of the plundering villagers was directed at Muslims was not purely coincidental. Godhra provided the spark and then, egged on and in many cases even led by outsiders, some of these villagers lost all reason. The fact that at many places the police were bystanders, acted as fuel to the fire. So did the fact that many insiders had over the last few years been brainwashed by a particular political ideology. It is interesting to note that field reports from north Gujarat and parts of central Gujarat now suggest that most of the trouble erupted in Patel-dominated areas. These reports also say that in many cases the targeted Muslims were provided cover by members of other castes such as khastriyas or harijans. (Of course, many Patel villages also remained free from trouble and in places kshatriyas also joined in the arson). Nearly 35 per cent of Gujarat’s population comprises Patels. The Patels, originally tillers of land, came on their own after Independence after land ownership was conferred on them. The green revolution was the hour of glory for the Patels and they became a force to reckon with in the seventies. After a shaky start with the Swatantra Party, the Patels shifted en masse to the Congress. The first Patel chief minister of Gujarat was Chimanbhai Patel. At the fag end of his second term in the early nineties, the Patels began to desert the Congress ship. In the 20 years the Patels also became an entrepreneurial class — besides farming, they are into business and trade in a big way. Large numbers have migrated abroad and the ‘motels of Potels’ are quite well known. Today the core of the BJP’s support in the state comes from Patels. Along with brahmins and banias (who jointly comprise an estimated 12 per cent of the population), the PBB trio today rules the state. During the tenure of Keshubhai Patel — which ended last November — the chief minister was frequently accused of practising ‘Patelism’ by which the Patels were given disproportionate importance in administration. After the departure of Keshubhai, the Patels have been growing restive and before the communal carnage there had been talk of the votebank shifting back to the Congress. The kshatriyas (estimated at 15 per cent of the population) and harijans (10 per cent) along with Muslims (10 per cent) and adivasis (10 per cent) formed the well known power coalition of KHAM devised by the then Congress chief minister Madhavsinh Solanki in the mid-eighties. The KHAMs are now out of power. When the BJP talks of a Hindu consolidation in the state after the communal riots, all the party means is that the likelihood of the Patel vote deserting the party has been reduced. The adivasis have played a big role in the present riots. They have been at the forefront of looting in north Gujarat districts like Sabar-kantha and central Gujarat districts such as Dahod, Panchmahal (of which Godhra is a part) and Vadodara. Traditionally underprivileged, the fact that the adivasi aggression was due to economic reasons is clear from what happened in Chota Udepur sub-division of Vadodara district. A day after some level-headed local administrator decided to start government-sponsored employment programmes, the adivasi aggression stopped in that place. Field reports suggest that the adivasis, who for centuries paid obeisance to manifestations of nature like the sun, have now started talking in terms of Ram, Sita and Lakshman. This may be the result of work put in by vanvasi kalyan kendras set up by the sangh parivar in tribal Gujarat. The Hindu identity taken on by these adivasis may also be responsible for their targeting Muslims, spurred on undoubtedly by outside miscreants. With pressures on agriculture, both Ahmedabad and Vadodara have seen large-scale migration from outlying rural areas in recent years. Vadodara which was on a par with cities like Pune and Bangalore in the early seventies is now the picture of a stagnating city. All the large central public sector units of companies like Indian Oil and IPCL survive but many of them are in bad shape. Ancillary units in nearby industrial estates are closing down. All this means that no new jobs have been created to absorb the migrants or even the new generation of locals. After the decline of the textile industry, Ahmedabad which was once called the Manchester of the East has been left bereft of any substantial manufacturing activity. The size of the unorganised industry like diamond polishing and powerlooms in the city is too small to absorb all the manpower available. Neither has retailing or construction activities of any substantial size been spawned in Ahmedabad. All this has given rise to a class of young, unemployed persons in the two cities. Full of energy and without any work to do, many of these young persons have fallen prey to the ideology of hate spread by certain political formations and without any thought have participated in the dance of death seen on the streets of Ahmedabad and Vadodara recently.

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